USING OPEN-ENDED TOOLS IN FACILITATING LANGUAGE LEARNING
LESSON 1 Productivity Software Applications for Language Teaching and Learning
Open-ended Tools and their Uses in Teaching and Learning Language Skills
• Open ended tools or productivity software applications are ICT tools, which help the help teachers and learners make their learning together concrete, efficient, encouraging, and meaningful.
21st Century characteristics to be able to meet the demand of 21st Century learners are:
- creating a learner-centered classroom and make make the instruction personalized
- facilitating the student’s productivity skills so they can produce movies that can enhance their skills.
- learning new technologies
- being globally competitive and learn different languages, and acquire communication skills
- being smart and allowing the use of devices as aids for the language acquisition
- do blogging
- promote “go paperless” advocacy by using digitals
- collaborate with other educators and students to have the opportunity of sharing ideas
- using web chats to share research and ideas
- connecting with people with the same vibes by using media
- introducing Project-Based Learning
- building positive digital footprint
- feeling of writing a page with HTML
- innovating teaching toolbox for the sake the students
- Keep learning
How the various productivity software applications can be used in the language classrooms:
A. Using Word in Scaffolding Student Learning in a Language Classroom
• we have to explore how these are maximized by teachers. Scaffolding is a various forms of support given to assist, guide, or facilitate the learning process.
Creating Learning Plans Using a Word Applications
• this will help you plan, organize, share, implement, and enhance your learning plans in teaching your language courses.
Step 1: Testing Your Knowledge of Word Processing Software Applications
Step 2: Viewing the Essential Parts of Learning Plans
1. Intel Teach Unit Plan
2. Depart of Education (DepEd) - requires teachers to develop and submit their lesson plan.
3. Masusing Banghay Aralin sa Filipino - Filipino is being taught as an academic subject and is being used also as a language of instruction.
4. Syllabus - teaching language courses requires learning plan.
Step 3: Sharing the Features of Word Applications for Scaffolding Student Learning
Preparing Process Guides and Graphic Organizers using Word Processing Software Applications
• explore some process guides that you may implement to help students to do their assignments and perform various tasks supported by productivity software application tools.
Step 1: The Relevance of Providing Process Guides and Graphic Organizers in Language Learning
• allow students to become more efficient and productive in performing their learning tasks.
Step 2: Example of Process Guides as Scaffold in Language Teaching and Learning
• brainstorm and analyze some examples of process guides in language teaching and learning
1. Select a leader in a group.
2. Present the question or idea to be brainstormed.
3. Present sample steps of teaching reading and let the students research and develop a guide foe each step.
4. Using graphic organizers
A. Venn Diagram
• a diagram representing mathematical or logical sets pictorially as circles or closed curves within an enclosing rectangle, common elements of the sets being represented by the areas of overlap among the circles.
B. Frayer Model
• a graphic organizer that helps students determine or clarify the meaning of vocabulary words encountered while listening, reading, and viewing texts. It is used before reading to activate background knowledge, during reading to monitor vocabulary, or after reading to assess vocabulary.
C. Bubble Diagram
• a very simple drawing that consists of roughly drawn bubbles (representing spaces) connected by solid lines, broken lines or wavy lines etc. to specify the type of relationship between the spaces.
D. T Chart
• used to separate information into two categories. A T chart can be used to compare and contrast two things, to list advantages and disadvantages, to separate facts from opinions, etc.
E. Fishbone Map
• a visualization tool for categorizing the potential causes of a problem. This tool is used in order to identify a problem's root causes.
F. Inductive Tower
• graphic representation of inductive thinking, with some factual elements as a base, a second level. of statements interpreting related facts, another level. asserting generalizations based on interpretations, and a fourth level asserting hypothetical, cause/effect relationships or a value position.
G. Flow Chart
• represents a workflow or process. It shows the steps as boxes of various kinds, and their order by connecting the boxes with arrows.
H. Story Map
• a web map that has been thoughtfully created, given context, and provided with supporting information so it becomes a stand-alone resource.
I. 5Ws Chart
• a type of graphic organizer that let the student think about and list the "Who, When, Where, What, and Why" of a story or event in a simple visual way.
Step 4: Using Presentation in Teaching Language Skills
A. Using Presentations in Teaching Language Skills
• language teachers can use computers to create visually and audibly appealing presentations that utilize a variety of media tools. Students can also develop their project outputs and reports to be able to shae in the class. It can be used as presentation tool in a innovative skill integration task, and other as a novel writing tool.
1. Reading
• the students may analyze the articles critically, compare ans contrast the ideas presented, synthesize and evaluate.
2. Writing
• difficult but very profitable language task. Students can recognize a suitable sequence for the points and divide the points into slides.
3. Speaking
• students have to rehearse the pronunciation of difficult words, time themselves, and make sure that they have all the English lexicon needed for their speech.
4. Listening
• the class listens to the oral presentation. Listening to a non-native speaker is not easy, and visual elements facilitate comprehension.
Basic Instructional Design in Preparing Presentations
1. Setting Up the Presentation Class
• students have to bw taught the skills involved in giving a presentation. We can use wye contact, how to recognize a presentation, how to connect with an audience how to use body language and manage time.
2. Organization of the Presentation
• one of the most important competencies that must be developed among students. There is a need to learn how to separate the presentation into meaningful sections.
3. Presentation Skills
• spend time to consider the macro and micro skills that are needed.
4. The Use of Visual Aids
• it is important because they provide support for both the speakers and listeners during the presentation.
5. Performing Self-Reflection
• through this, writing skills are further enhanced together with the ability of the students to do self-reflection.
B. Using Spreadsheets in Language Learning
• one can teach with tablea and charts, make a table and a graph, compute students' grades.
MICROSOFT WORD ALTERNATIVES
1. Drop Box Paper
• a free online word processor offered by the online cloud storage provider. It allows you to do many things that go beyond creating a textual document. And it also allows you to access app that let you embed YouTube videos or slideshares.
2. Office Online
• free online alternative for MS Word that allows you to open, create and edit word documents online.
3. Google Docs
• allows you to create, collaborate and share documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings and even forms. We can also have the documents published as a web page, downloaded or emailed as an attachment in Word, ODT. PDF, plain text or RTF formats.
4. Etherpad
• an online document editor primarily intended for collaborative editing in, as the site claims, "really real time". It is appealing to users who are reluctant to use services which require email registration.
5. Zoho
• free online applications including Writer for word processing. You can import and work with MS Word documents, allowing you tp insert images, and edit content as needed.
6. OpenOffice
• it includes six programs that use the same engine making inherently the same and extremely easy to learn and use. The 6 applications included are: Writer (word processor), Cale (spreadsheets), Impress (presentations), Draw (graphics) and Base (database manipulation) and Math (mathematical equations).
7. AbiWord
• a free word processing application very similar to Microsoft Word. It allows you to automatically fill in specific form fields in documents with information from databases and comma separated or tabbed text files.
8. Jarte
• it is based on Microsoft WordPad Engine, but is still free that is more adequate and fully compatible with Word and WordPad documents.
9. WPS Office 2016 Free
• a free document processing suite whose WPS Writer app will serve you well as a Microsoft Word alternative. It can open and save to a long list popular file formats native to those applications like docx, doc, ans more.
10. SoftMaker FreeOffice
• another great free suite that offers a full featured Microsoft Word alternative. It allows you to focus on creating documents just as you would in MS Word.
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